Ubuntu

What to do when you lost a home passphrase ?

Asked by Mathieu Cossette

What to do when you a home passphrase is lost ?

My home is encrypted but in case I need to decrypt it or access it .... What can I do to recover my passphrase !!??

I've always made backups of my data but.. if some day the question pops up in the terminal ... I do not remember where I put my passphrase (written down in 2010 ..... on a paper :( .... )

I have a Ubuntu 12.04LTS installed on my hard drive with no Windows OS.

I have my login password but don't remember my passphrase .. :(

Thanks for the great help here :)

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Wyatt Smith
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Best Wyatt Smith (wyatt-smith) said : 		#1

Recovering Your Mount Passphrase

In the event that you did not write down your mount passphrase, you may be able to recover it by decrypting the file /home/username/.ecryptfs/wrapped-passphrase using your login passphrase.

     ecryptfs-unwrap-passphrase /home/username/.ecryptfs/wrapped-passphrase
    Type your login passphrase to reveal the mount passphrase

If your login passphrase matches the passphrase used to encrypt the wrapped-passphrase file, your mount passphrase will be written to screen. Record and protect this data accordingly.

If you have lost your wrapped-passphrase file, and you did not record your mount passphrase, it is impossible to access your encrypted data.

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Mathieu Cossette (mcossette) said : 		#2

Thanks from the bottom of my heart ! ;) :)

I will keep my email answer and check this tomorrow... have to go sleep hehe

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Mathieu Cossette (mcossette) said : 		#3

Thanks Wyatt Smith, that solved my question.